


A Grain of Truth in Every Tale

by thewightknight



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Fake/Pretend Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:33:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24194374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewightknight/pseuds/thewightknight
Summary: It's that time of year again, when Jaskier's parents make their annual visit. It'll be a week of disapproval and barbed comments, but he'll survive. He always does.Except this year, it'll be different, because the bouncer at the club where he performs has offered to pretend to be his boyfriend. Now he just has to get through the week without anything going wrong.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 26
Kudos: 618





	A Grain of Truth in Every Tale

“So our flight arrives at two p.m. You will be there to meet us, won’t you, dear?” Jaskier’s mother asks. She doesn’t ask the questions he’s come to expect. “When are you going to give up music and get a real job?” and “With the hours you keep, how are you ever going to meet anyone?” and “You’re not getting any younger, you know?”

His parents are coming in to visit next week and he’s a mess. It’s so bad that the bouncer of the club where he performs notices. Jaskier has had a crush on Geralt since the first day he saw him, but he doesn’t think Geralt has ever noticed him. Whenever he sings, Geralt is never looking at him (that he knows), and whenever Jaskier has tried to talk to him, he just says “Hm”.

But at the end of the night, after the club’s closed and Jaskier is having a beer before calling a Lyft to take him home, Geralt sees Jaskier’s hands shaking as he lifts a bottle to his lips.

“Is something wrong?” he asks. “Has someone been bothering you? Stalking you?” His voice drops to a growl at this, and Jaskier, who suffers from extreme verbal diarrhea, lets everything spill out.

“My parents are coming to visit and it's going to be awful,” he says, taking another drink. Geralt grunts, and he takes that as encouragement.

“They come every year and it’s always the same. They don’t approve of me. Being a musician isn't good enough for them. I should have become a lawyer or a politician, not a musician. And I’m single, which is an added insult.”

Geralt grunts again.

“I don’t know. Maybe I should rent an actor to pretend to be my boyfriend. That could at least get them off my back about something.”

“Rent?” Geralt asks, one eyebrow shooting up.

“Well it’s not like I could get anyone to _pretend_ to be my boyfriend,” Jaskier says. When Geralt asks "why not?", he nearly drops the bottle. And for the first time (that he knows) Geralt looks directly at him and he melts as Geralt makes him an offer he knows he should refuse.

“I can do it.”

“I know nothing about you. It’ll never work,” Jaskier protests, even as he knows he’s going to accept.

"We have six days. We can learn," Geralt says.

So they meet for lunch the next day and spend the afternoon wandering around the city. He makes Geralt laugh and his insides go all gooey. Jaskier gets a picture of him, leaning on the railing of a bridge overlooking water, and makes it the background on his phone, ignoring how his heart twists. As the afternoon progresses he finds out Geralt doesn’t talk about his past because he was abandoned as a baby and his foster family, well, wasn’t great. Jaskier wants to kiss away the furrow between Geralt’s brows when he changes the subject.

Geralt doesn’t like getting his picture taken. He doesn’t like his eyes, although Jaskier thinks they’re beautiful. So of course this means Jaskier has to take as many pictures of him as possible over the next five days. He puts them in a separate folder on his phone and renames them all so it’s not obvious that they’re all recent. In most of them, Geralt’s scowling. It’s adorable.

Geralt's favorite word is 'fuck'. He likes a good scotch, and can make a mean pulled pork. In fact, he excels at cooking any and every kind of meat and looks at salads like they’re dubious life forms from another planet. The face he makes whenever Jaskier orders a salad makes Jaskier want to order salads for the rest of his life because he’s so damn cute when he glowers like that.

Geralt comes with him to the airport to meet his parents. Jaskier’s a vibrating bundle of nerves until Geralt takes his hand. It engulfs him and makes him feel like he could conquer the world.

“There he is,” he hears his mother say, and he turns to greet them, Geralt a comforting presence at his back.

Jaskier’s parents look at Geralt when they’re introduced, and he can feel the disapproval radiating off of them. A bouncer? Really? Maybe Jaskier would be better off single after all. They don’t say that, but he can practically hear their thoughts.

It’s tradition. After they land, they drag Jaskier out for lunch before going to their penthouse suite at their favorite overpriced hotel. They always book the best table at the swankiest restaurant and are rude to the servers and Jaskier wants to disappear, and he’s afraid to eat or drink anything because he is sure the staff is spitting in their food.

Every time they say something rude, Geralt glares at them. Jaskier loves watching his parents squirm under the weight of Geralt’s stare. Eventually they start being almost polite to the staff, but this means all their disapproval spills over onto him.

Geralt is even less amused at this. The next time Jaskier’s father lets a dig fall about poor choices in life and working at dead-end jobs, Geralt drops a bombshell. “He’s done well enough. His album should be ready soon.”

That hadn’t been in the plan. Jaskier manages not to choke, but it’s a near thing.

“An album? Really? Who’s financing it?” Jaskier’s father asks, almost sneering. He’s well aware of Jaskier’s finances, as he has to ask his father for help with the rent several times a year.

“Oh, I am,” Geralt says, and Jaskier kicks him under the table.

“I hardly think a bouncer could come up with the financing for such a project,” his father says.

“I’m not a bouncer," Geralt says, ignoring Jaskier's frantic squeezing of his hand under the table. "I own half of the club where Jaskier performs.”

Jaskier almost faints, because his father will look into it and he’ll find out Geralt’s lying. He manages to keep from exploding until after they say their goodbyes and have seen his parents off to their hotel. Once they’re out of earshot, he rounds on Geralt.

“Why would you say that? My father is going to run a check on you and he’ll find out it’s not true.”

“It is true, Jaskier,” Geralt says.

“No, Yennefer owns the club.” Yennefer Vengerberg is a shrewd businesswoman and has run the club with an iron fist for over a decade. She scares the salt out of Jaskier. As if he knows this, Geralt smirks at him.

“She owns half the club. I’m a silent partner.”

“But you’re the bouncer,” Jaskier protests.

“I like it,” Geralt says. “It lets me keep an eye on things.” He says this as he’s looking Jaskier right in the eyes and Jaskier has to tell himself that no, Geralt is not talking about keeping an eye on him in particular.

The week passes and Jaskier sees his parents as little as possible. He gets off the hook on several occasions when he asks if Geralt can accompany him to the events they have planned. On the times when he does see them, Geralt always manages to tag along and his glowers and monosyllables manage to deflect most of their barbs.

Five days later he takes them to the airport. Geralt drives them all in a massive black SUV that he apparently owns, and that Jaskier has never seen before. Jaskier swears he hears him whispering to the car as they’re sitting at a stoplight and does catch him patting the steering wheel in a manner that’s almost affectionate.

Thank all the gods for the TSA. It gets Jaskier out of having to see them to their gate and waiting for their flight to arrive. They say goodbye on the curb, and it’s less frosty and distant than usual. They don’t approve of Geralt, not completely, but he’s passed some test with them. Maybe by being an apparently rich and definitely gorgeous boyfriend? He doesn’t know and really doesn’t care.

“See you next year,” they say as they part and he has a moment of panic, because there’s no way Geralt will be willing to play boyfriend again next year, and he couldn’t ask him, anyway.

That night he sings his set, and then the band takes over. He’s having his usual beer at the bar when Geralt appears at his elbow. Taking Jaskier by the elbow, he leads him out to the dance floor, and surprise, Geralt can dance. He leads and Jaskier follows, matching his steps as if they’d been doing this for years, and they fit so well together. He’s got Geralt’s hands on his hips and Geralt’s eyes boring into him and it’s everything he’s ever imagined and now he’s freaking out even worse because his parents are gone now and why is Geralt doing this?

And then Geralt leans in, cheek so close to his, and because he never thinks about the words that spill out of his mouth before he says them, Jaskier asks, “Ever think about if we were doing this for real?”

He feels Geralt freeze, and that’s it—he’s blown it. Why can’t he ever shut up? He mutters an apology and tries to pull away, but Geralt’s arms are like steel bands holding him in place, and they pull him even closer than he was before.

“What would you do if it was?” Geralt asked, cheek now pressed against his, breath warm against his skin.

And now, for the first time in his life, his words betray him. Traitorous things. He can’t speak because his mouth has dried up and his tongue feels like it’s swollen and clumsy and his heart is trying to beat its way out of his chest. One of Geralt’s hands has moved from his hip to the small of his back and Geralt is molded to him, and he’s sure Geralt can hear his heartbeat, because it’s so loud in his ears.

Geralt seems content to wait for his answer. The silence between them stretches on, as the music pulses and others dance around them. When the song comes to an end, the DJ threading the end bars with the next, Geralt murmurs in his ear, “Think about it,” and leaves Jaskier standing in the middle of the dance floor, mouth opening and closing like a beached fish.

And he does think about it. He thinks about it for all of ten seconds or so—the amount of time it takes for Geralt to reach the end of the floor. Snapping his jaw shut, he practically runs after Geralt. So intent is he on his goal that he doesn’t notice the couple spinning his way until it’s too late. They barrel into him, knocking him flying, and he’s saved from hitting the floor by a pair of strong arms.

“Are you all right?” Geralt asks.

Instead of answering, he stretches up onto his toes and kisses Geralt. He has an instant of panic, wondering if he’s gone too far, but then he realizes Geralt’s kissing him back. Someone whistles, but he ignores it, concentrating instead on the strong hands that hold him, chasing the taste of scotch on Geralt’s lips.

**ONE YEAR LATER**

Jaskier bounces on his toes, trying to read the flight board in the baggage claim area.

“They’re late,” he announces. Geralt grunts in response.

“Um, excuse me,” someone says from behind him. When turns, a teenager with red hair is standing behind him, a pen held in one hand and a magazine in the other. “You’re Jaskier, right? Can I get your autograph?”

The album that Geralt had made up a year ago has become fact. Yennefer had worked some magic, and a studio had become available and an album had been cut and somehow he’d gotten air time and now here he was.

“Thank you!” the girl says, practically quivering with excitement as he signs his name with a flourish above his glossy color photo. It wasn’t Rolling Stone, but Yennefer assures him it’s only a matter of time.

“There they are!” Jaskier hears, and he looks up to see his mother waving at them. She’s smiling. He blinks, sure he’s imagining it, or maybe his contacts have blurred, but no, his first impression is correct.

“Darling,” she says as she kisses the air on either side of his face. To Geralt’s utter dismay, she hugs him. “And Geralt. Good to see you again.”

Was that warmth in her voice?

“Pinch me,” he mutters to Geralt as she joins his father, looking for their bags on the carousel, and then he yelps when Geralt does pinch him, on the ass, because he’s a bastard. He grins when Jaskier tells him this.

“Here we are,” his father says, dragging his rolling bag behind him. “Who’s up for lunch?”

“I thought we might go something different today,” Jaskier tells him. “There’s a new bistro I’d like you to try.” He’d mention later that Geralt also owns part of the restaurant. To both their bemusement, his mother links arms with Geralt and starts chattering away at him as she practically drags him out to the curb. His grunts don’t discourage her.

“Looks like you’ve got a good one there,” his father tells him as they wait for a cab.

“Yes, father, I think I do.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you want to say hi, [check out my profile](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewightknight/profile) for where I’m currently hanging out on this here internet thing. If you liked this, please share! Kudos are love and comments are always appreciated.


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